There is a wide range of accessories available for enhancing the comfort, ease, and pleasure of outdoor, leisure activities and excursions. Such activities and excursions can include camping, hiking, backpacking, picnics, amusement and water park jaunts, and both outdoor and indoor pool and beach swimming, sun tanning and relaxation. Such accessories that accompanying aquatic-type excursions can include beach chairs, floating chairs, beach balls, loungers, recliners, coolers, submergible flotation devices, inflatable and non-submersible flotation devices, tote bags, towels, a change of clothes, Frisbees, umbrellas, and toys such as pails, buckets, and shovels. Transporting such paraphernalia from a car, SUV or bathhouse to the beach or swimming pool area can prove quite a challenge, especially if it involves a family with small children. The children are generally unable to carry many of the above items; it is left for the parents to make a number of back and forth trips to place all the accessories on the beach or on deck chairs that surround the motel swimming pool. In many cases the swimming pool or beach may be separated from the parking lot by hundreds of feet, and transporting all the desired leisure and outdoor accessories, especially in hot summer weather, is an unpleasant task that can sour even the most upbeat vacationer or beach aficionado. This problem is further compounded if a mother is taking children that include a small baby to the local public swimming pool or public beach. Transporting even some of the above paraphernalia while carrying a baby is an onerous task, and since the baby cannot be left alone, the mother will have to carry the baby to the vehicle when retrieving all of the accessories, toys and infant essentials; and then the mother will have to balance the accessories, toys and infant essentials and the baby in the trip back to the beach or swimming pool. Given the aforementioned problems, it would be desirable to have some way to carry a number of items in a convenient and compact manner. In addition, it would be desirable for the carrying or transport device to be a multi-purpose device to increase its usefulness. Thus, the prior art discloses a number of devices that are convertible from one function to another, and are primarily used in outdoor, leisure and recreation activities and excursions.
For example, the Ross et al. patent (U.S. Pat. No. 4,687,248) discloses a convertible lounge chair/tote bag that includes back, base and leg supports supported on foldable legs, and which can be folded up into a tote bag for carrying and storage.
The Venza patent (U.S. Pat. No. 5,299,337) discloses a portable beach lounge that includes hingabley connected carrying containers that form the chair and a foldable canopy assembly for disposition above the individual's head.
The Storey et al. patent (U.S. Pat. No. 5,439,405) discloses a combination tote bag, semi-submersible floating chair/recliner and beach chair/pad that includes a number of interconnected buoyant cushioned sections so that the individual can float in a semi-flat or sitting disposition.
The Tribelsky et al. patent (U.S. Pat. No. 5,460,426) discloses a combination carrying case and folding seat that includes a first articulated section and a second articulated section pivotally interconnected by an elongated bottom enclosure wherein the articulated sections can be brought together for carrying and portability.
The Jay et al. patent (U.S. Pat. No. 5,588,696) discloses a convertible chair with arm rests that convert to a backpack that includes an assembly that converts to a beach-type chair and has webbing material for the storage of items therein.
The Godshaw patent (U.S. Pat. No. 5,785,427) discloses a convertible seat and tote bag that includes a pair of foldable panels that are interconnected by a supporting member that restrain the individual when one of the panels is used as a chair back, and a pair of side flaps that convert the device to a tote bag.
Despite the ingenuity of the above devices, their remains a need for a portable combination leisure, vacation, and beach accessory that can be used to store and carry items and also used as a mat or a seat or chair cover.